Planted aquarium

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Bajormatt

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Dec 3, 2012
143
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Illinois
Would a planted aquarium be good for cichlids? I'm thinking about keeping my rocks the same and just putting moss on the rocks and putting dwarf hair grass around to fill in-between the rock and then maybe some taller plants and a piece of drift wood at the top as well with moss on it.


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I'm making my take into a species only tank of yellow labs. I want to add the deep greens from the moss and lighter greens from the hair grass to contrast with the black background, black sand, and yellow of the fish and add a lot of depth to the tank. I have a CO2 diffuser ready to go, Im trying to figure out if the labs will be good with plants. Right now, they don't dig much, just swim around and what not. I'm moving the other fish to a smaller tank for a bit or I may just exchange them for more yellow labs


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Bajormatt said:
I'm making my take into a species only tank of yellow labs. I want to add the deep greens from the moss and lighter greens from the hair grass to contrast with the black background, black sand, and yellow of the fish and add a lot of depth to the tank. I have a CO2 diffuser ready to go, Im trying to figure out if the labs will be good with plants. Right now, they don't dig much, just swim around and what not. I'm moving the other fish to a smaller tank for a bit or I may just exchange them for more yellow labs


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Yellow labs like plants don't be surprised if they eat them. Eventually they will dig if you have sand not so much in gravel.

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I've altered my labs diet a lot, I used to feed them a veggie shrimp mix and now they're on just the shrimp a long with some flakes to keep them occupied. Would that help? Or will they still nip at the plants? And what about the driftwood and will plecos eat the plants as well?


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I would not just feed them a diet of shrimp this will make them more susceptible to malawi bloat in my opinion. I would keep their diet varied with good spirulina flake as well as a wholesome cichlid pellet like NLS or whatever your preference is. Many will vouch for NLS as I would myself as being a good all around food. They have a tendency to nip at plants regardless of their diet but they usually will not down right destroy them. Driftwood may not be your best bet depending on your PH as it has the ability with it's tannic acid to lower your pH which mbuna like a higher one. Not all pleco's eat/destroy plants it depends on the species in my opinion here, but I am not a pleco expert by any means.
 
My pleco is just a little guy so I figured I could get him used to eat. I'm just worried about him eating the moss I'm going to put in there. My ph is around 8.4 or 8.5 and the wood piece has already soaked and what not, has anyone has success with a planted African tank? I haven't really heard of a lot of people heavily planting an African tank


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